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Information

User Agreement

The New Apostolic Church operates an inter-active online facility as a social network, which is available through various domains in internet. It comprises a communication network (hereinafter: “nacworld”) in which registered users can make contact and communicate between themselves.

nacworld is primarily aimed at New Apostolic Christians. Participation is equally possible for persons with other religious beliefs. Registered users are able to publish information about themselves, to join groups or to form new groups, to invite friends and acquaintances to join a group, to search for other users within nacworld, as well as other functions which are available for their use.

1. General – What you should know about the application of this user agreement.

1.1 The New Apostolic Church permits access to and use of nacworld on the basis of this user agreement, which governs not only the conduct between the New Apostolic Church, as operator of nacworld, and the registered user but also the conduct between users of nacworld.

1.2 The user agreement applies to all contents, functions and other services (hereinafter: “applications”), which the New Apostolic Church may offer in nacworld. Supplementary conditions may prevail to users for additional applications provided in the course of time (hereinafter: “supplementary conditions”). Users will be timely informed by the New Apostolic Church of any possible supplementary conditions which result from new applications.

1.3 The use of certain applications within nacworld may be restricted to certain users and/or to user groups. This will especially be the case for such applications which require the certification of supplementary conditions or special agreement.

2. Registration – How can I use nacworld?

It is necessary to register to be able to use nacworld. The registration is free of charge.

2.1 Any person is eligible to register. Those who have not reached the age of legal competency according to the laws of their country of residence affirm that they will only register with the consent of their parent or legal guardian. nacworld reserves the right to make individual validity checks of compliance. The guardianship programme, which is explained under the heading of Guardian programme, applies to members under 14 years of age wishing to register.

2.2 Each user is only allowed to register once. On registering, the user affirms, that he is not yet a member of nacworld, or that a former open account has been deleted, as appropriate (see also paragraph 3.1).

2.3 The registration process begins with a registration form. The data requested (first name, surname, date of birth, gender, e-mail address) must be fully and correctly completed. Pen names, pseudonyms, abbreviations or other fanciful descriptions are not permitted. It is similarly forbidden to register an account with false or other inappropriate details. All other details entered in a profile are voluntary.

2.4 When the registration data has been entered the New Apostolic Church will promptly send access confirmation by e-mail to the given e-mail address of the user. The registration process is first successfully completed when the user activates the activation link sent with the e-mail. The contract with nacworld between the user and the New Apostolic Church comes into existence with the link activation.

2.4.1 Following successful registration the user has the possibility to access nacworld via the log in area. To do this the e-mail address and password created by the user must be entered.

2.4.2 Should the registration be incomplete the New Apostolic Church will delete the account including all data which has been entered to that point.

2.5 There is no entitlement to complete a contract of use. The New Apostolic Church can refuse registration without justification. In this case the New Apostolic Church will promptly delete the data input through the registration form.

2.6 An identification of persons in internet is limited. It follows therefore that the New Apostolic Church cannot safely exclude that false contact data lies behind a registration application. On the part of the New Apostolic Church no responsibility will be accepted for the real identity of any user; a user must satisfy himself of the identity of other users.

3. De-registration – how can I delete my account by nacworld?

3.1 Should a user no longer wish to use nacworld he can terminate the contract of use at any time without giving grounds and without waiting for a deadline – within nacworld this process is called “Delete account”. To delete an account the user simply activates the link “Delete account”, which is found in the column “My nacworld”. The option is also given to terminate per e-mail under info@nacworld.net or in writing to the New Apostolic Church giving the last used e-mail address of the nacworld account to be deleted.

3.2 The contract of use can also be terminated at any time by the New Apostolic Church subject to a deadline of fourteen days up to the end of the month. The right, however, to terminate for important reasons or to deny a user in accordance with the stipulations contained in section 6 of this user agreement remains unaffected.

3.3 With the successful deletion of an account all personal data of the user is permanently deleted. The entries written and publicized by the user before de-registering from nacworld (e.g. Guestbook/blog of another user or within a group) will remain intact after the user has de-registered – that is, however, less the user’s name and with the note that the entry stems from a deleted account.

4. Subject matter of the contract – what does nacworld offer?

4.1 In nacworld the user has various applications available to him. These applications contain, in particular:

* setting up of so-called profiles (“My profile”) and comparable functions to input data (e.g. texts, pictures, graphics) which can be viewed by all users and/or just for specified user groups of nacworld,
* setting up of functions to communicate with third parties (e.g. dispatch of mail to other users of nacworld),
* setting up of functions for the purpose of forming, administering and usage of groups within nacworld.

4.2 The New Apostolic Church is eager to continuously further develop nacworld. Within the framework of these developments nacworld and its applications will be improved and/or expanded. Irrespectively; the maximum savable data capacity per user will remain restricted.

4.3 Demands on the usage of nacworld and its applications are purely within the bounds of current technology. It may be occasionally necessary to reduce the performance within nacworld – for instance when nearing capacity limits, in the interests of security of nacworld, to maintain the integrity of the server or to carry out technical measures in the interest of an orderly provision of performance. In the justifiable consideration of users the New Apostolic Church will give advance warning, for example, of planned maintenance of nacworld on the website.

4.4 nacworld especially serves to bring users together and to give them the opportunity of communication, and also to make official information of the New Apostolic Church International available. For this purpose the New Apostolic Church places the technical applications and information at the users’ disposal. The New Apostolic Church does not participate, however, in the communication amongst or between users.

4.5 The New Apostolic Church particularly warns users of nacworld of so-called hyperlinks, with, amongst other things, contents from external sources and applications of third parties (hereinafter: third party contacts). Such third party contacts are marked with a corresponding heading (e.g. “Advertisement” or “This is an offer from [name of the third party]”. Should a contract be offered in connection with such third party contacts, it will then exist solely between the user and the third party contact.

5. User obligations – what is expected when using nacworld

In order that nacworld can function with its multitude of users it is required that all users abide by certain rules.

5.1 When registering and with reference to access data

5.1.1 The password generated on registering must be confidentially handled and must not be given to a third party. It is also strictly forbidden for those working for the New Apostolic Church to ask a user for his password. Users are forbidden from offering third parties the possibility of using nacworld with alien data. Should suspicion arise of third party knowledge of access data and/or of account misuse, the user is obligated to inform the New Apostolic Church without delay.

5.1.2 Users are obligated to update later changes to the access data of their accounts without delay. Such corrections are made in nacworld under “Edit profile”.

5.2 When placing material within nacworld

5.2.1 Users are responsible for the contents (including texts, pictures, graphics and links) which they make available or distribute in nacworld. Thereby it is incumbent on users to ensure that the material which they may have respectively placed in nacworld is legitimate; particularly that it is not contrary to applicable laws and that it is not damaging to third parties.

5.2.2 It is prohibited to make contents of nacworld available or to distribute them if and insofar as they are contrary to lawful regulations, the rights of third parties or against common decency. Furthermore, all users are obliged to observe the binding code of conduct for the use of nacworld, which can be more stringent than applicable statutory provisions.

5.3 When publishing media

5.3.1 Every user has the possibility to upload media data in nacworld and to place it in his own profile (“My profile”). It is also possible for the founders of nacworld to upload media data within nacworld.

5.3.2 Furthermore, before starting an upload of media, the user must ensure and, in so doing, guarantees that he is the owner of photos or relevant data which he is publishing in nacworld or that he has, for other reasons, obtained exclusive rights to publish the photo or data and that the publication of the picture file for general public viewing does not violate legal regulations, including amongst other things data protection laws, utilization regulations, intellectual property rights, copyrights, contractual or other rights of natural or juristic persons, as well as common decency.

5.3.3 It is forbidden to upload picture files in nacworld depicting violence and/or to make them available for public access; additionally picture files may not contain any sexual, discriminatory, offensive, racist, libelous or any other illegal content or interpretation. It is also forbidden to upload any picture files exclusively depicting business or goods trademarks or any other protected trademarks.

5.3.4 The intention of uploading or linking photograph files where, apart from the user, another or more persons are identifiable can only be realized with the agreement of the third party/parties.

5.3.5 Any user who has uploaded a picture file may remove or replace it at any time.

5.3.6 The New Apostolic Church reserves the right to remove picture files and/or links to any user without prior warning when and insofar as concrete evidence exists before the New Apostolic Church that a breach of contract has occurred or that offensive or illegal contents are available through public access within nacworld or that the rights of natural or juristic persons are impinged or that other natural or juristic persons are negatively affected. The judgement for such breaches lies entirely within the capacity of the New Apostolic Church.

5.4 In using the contents of nacworld

5.4.1 nacworld and its applications may only be used for private purposes. All contact data of nacworld users which is accessible through this inter-active online facility may therefore not be used by nacworld users for any other purpose than for private communication. The utilization of users’ data, for example, for the purpose of personnel data acquisition by employers, training organizations, personnel or employment agencies, universities, technical colleges or through comparable public or private educational establishments is not permitted.

5.4.2 Any usage of nacworld which aims to take advantage of its applications or available accesses for business, industrial or any other commercial purposes is forbidden. All users are obliged to observe the binding code of conduct for the use of nacworld, which can be more stringent than applicable statutory provisions.

5.4.3 The available contents of nacworld may not – with exception of legally acceptable instances – be copied, distributed or otherwise made publicly available without the authority of the respective legal owner. Similarly, the use of computer programs which automatically read data, as for example, crawlers (alias Spider or Robot, in short: bots) are also forbidden.

5.5 With respect to protecting users’ own data

Users are obliged to take adequate measures appropriate to the state of current technology, to protect information which is visible in nacworld and which is stored by the New Apostolic Church (e.g. messages within the messaging service). It is therefore the responsibility of users to store and/or print out any information which they consider of importance to the appropriate medium, preferably at the end of every session in nacworld, so that unlimited access to the data is possible independently of nacworld.

5.6 Concerning disruptions to nacworld

5.6.1 Disruptive attacks on nacworld are forbidden. It is particularly forbidden to resort to measures which could lead to excessive loading of nacworld (e.g. mass generation of information or messages [spam]) or to unacceptable disturbances of other users.

5.6.2 Electronic attacks on nacworld in any form (including any to the operating system of nacworld’s hardware and software), or to individual users, are forbidden. Included, within the meaning of electronic attacks, are the following listed examples:

- hacking attempts, meaning attempts to overcome, to by-pass or, by any other method of overriding the security mechanism of nacworld,
- the use of and/or spreading of viruses, worms or Trojans,
- brute force attacks,
- dispatch of unrequested advertisements (SPAM),
- any other measures or actions which could disruptively attack or damage nacworld – including any to the operating system of nacworld’s hardware and software - and/or the New Apostolic Church or users.

6. Sanctions and other consequences from violations by users

6.1 Compliance with this user agreement – in particular the terms within section 5 “User obligations” – is of considerable importance for the functionality of nacworld. Therefore the New Apostolic Church will place sanctions against any user when and insofar as concrete evidence exists before the New Apostolic Church that a user has violated lawful regulations, the rights of third parties, common decency and/or the code of conduct. Furthermore, the New Apostolic Church is entitled to remove incriminating contents from nacworld without prior warning.

6.2 The New Apostolic Church will include the rightful interest of any affected user in decisions to sanction. In doing so, consideration will be made, amongst other things, whether an unwitting malpractice has occurred or a culpable violation. The New Apostolic Church will take the following measures and sanctions into consideration:

* partial and complete deletion of a user’s contents,
* warning a user,
* limitation of use of nacworld applications,
* temporary barring of a user,
* permanent barring of a user.

6.3 If a user becomes barred from using nacworld he will be prohibited from further access to the website. Furthermore, a barred user is not allowed to re-register.

7. Release from liability through the user

The user releases the New Apostolic Church from all claims which third parties may bring to bear against the New Apostolic Church on the grounds of any breaches of their rights caused by the contents created by users within nacworld or through their usage otherwise of applications made available in nacworld. The likely costs of necessary legal defense actions by the New Apostolic Church, including all court and lawyers’ legal fees will be met by the user; this will not apply when an unwitting malpractice by the user has occurred. The user is obligated to inform the New Apostolic Church without delay, truthfully and fully in any instance of claims made by any third party and must provide all information which is available to him and which may be required for claim checks and for its defense. Any further damage claims by the New Apostolic Church against the user will remain unaffected.

8. Limited liability by the New Apostolic Church

8.1 In accordance with legal requirements, the New Apostolic Church, as service provider, is not obligated to supervise the communicated or stored information or, according to circumstances, to warn of any illegal activity. In this respect, the New Apostolic Church does not accept responsibility and gives no formal or implicated guarantee for any contents released by users or for the accuracy and reliability of contents released by users in nacworld. Should the New Apostolic Church, however, receive knowledge of an illegal activity by any user or obtain information of such within nacworld the information will be immediately removed or its access denied.

8.2 The New Apostolic Church accepts unrestricted liability against users for damages resulting from harm to life, body or health caused by intentional or negligent breach of duty, as well as for other damages which result from intentional or negligent breach of duty and from deceit. Furthermore, the New Apostolic Church accepts unrestricted liability for damages according to liability contained in compulsory statutory provisions, such as the product liability law, as well as in the acceptance of guarantees.

8.3 The New Apostolic Church accepts liability, limited to the value of foreseeable damages inherent in contracts, for such damages which are not contained within paragraph 8.2 and are caused by the culpable conduct of the legal representatives, executive employees or other persons providing assistance to the New Apostolic Church.

9. Data protection – What happens to data which is retrievable in nacworld?

9.1 The concept of nacworld is based on the publication of data and contents which are made visible to other users of nacworld. The user has the choice, however, of what data and contents he wishes to make available to other users. On the one hand the user decides himself the extent of personal details and contents he enters in his profile “My profile”) and on the other hand it is possible for the user to make changes at any time to reduce his detailed information (“Change settings”) and (“Edit privacy settings”).

9.2 Relevant for the collection, handling and usage of personal data by the New Apostolic Church are the effective data privacy laws, the general data protection information for the use of nacworld and the users’ declared acceptance for the handling of personal data.

9.3 Users are prohibited from passing on any contact information of any user of nacworld to any third party without the user’s consent, to use it and/or to make it available for the purpose of telephone traffic (e.g. undesired calls to mobile telephones [SPOM], over internet telephony [SPIT] or for commercial use through the application of electronic mail (e.g. undesired e-mails or SMS advertisements as well as via the messaging service of the New Apostolic Church or an instant messenger [SPIM]).

10. Miscellaneous: future changes and final provisions

10.1 The New Apostolic Church reserves the right to alter the conditions of this user agreement at any time and without giving reasons under consideration of the provisions in paragraphs 10.1.1 to 10.1.3, which follow.

10.1.1 By exception, every alteration to the description of the contract contents in section 4 of the user agreement is explicitly excluded from the above rights of alteration statement. The New Apostolic Church will therefore inform the user of possible changes and/or variations to the guaranteed benefits and will offer them as a continuation of the relationship with the user, whereby other conditions may then apply if, as a consequence of the change and/or variation, the interest of the user is affected. Hereby, the user’s right of termination at any time, as per paragraph 3.1 remains unaffected.

10.1.2 Other changes of conditions which are not covered within paragraph 10.1.1 will be sent by e-mail to the user at the latest in two weeks before they are to be incorporated. If the user does not disagree to the application of the new user agreement within two weeks following receipt of the e-mail, then the changed user agreement will be considered as accepted. The New Apostolic Church obligates itself to separately advise the user in the e-mail containing the changed conditions of the implication of the two weeks deadline.

10.1.3 If the user disagrees to the application of the new user agreement within the two weeks deadline, as stated in paragraph 10.1.2, the New Apostolic Church is then authorized to terminate the user’s contract in an orderly manner with a deadline of fourteen days.

10.2 The New Apostolic Church can use third parties as so-called assistants for the purpose of contract implementation and thereby fulfill the contractual performance obligated by the New Apostolic Church.

10.3 In lieu of the New Apostolic Church, it is possible that the rights and duties of third parties, working under contract for the New Apostolic Church, will come wholly or partially into effect with a termination deadline of one month. If such a case should occur the user is authorized to terminate his contract with the New Apostolic Church without justification (further information on de-registration in paragraph 3.1).

10.4 This user agreement and the contractual relationship between the New Apostolic Church and the user are exclusively governed by the laws of the Federal Republic of Germany. These rights only apply to the user as long as any superceding rights in the nation, in which the member normally resides, don´t nullify them.